Today's modular/movable wall systems (also called demountable walls) are available in a range of heights and configurations and in every kind of material including traditional drywall, glass, wood, wood composites, steel, etc. Movable wall systems are an environmentally friendly replacement for dry wall or sheet rock, which are most commonly used to create offices and rooms within an office building. Movable walls virtually eliminate construction waste and future renovation waste. Movable walls provide flexibility from the moment the space is built and throughout moves and changes. By industrial definition, a movable wall is a floor-to-ceiling wall just like traditional stud and drywall walls except that it is movable. The walls are built modularly in a factory and installed on-site. Modular wall panels are connected to form the movable wall. Movable walls may be taken down and relocated.
Movable walls may support hanging components such as shelves, cabinets and other furniture, artwork, desktops and other work surfaces, accessories, etc. Conventional vertical wall strips attach with wall fasteners to the movable walls to support the hanging components in a “vertical wall strip system.” A vertical wall strip is typically a 3-sided metal strip having vertically spaced mounting openings to receive the wall fasteners, usually spaced 6 to 8 inches apart and a plurality of parallel vertical slots that receive attachment hardware to support the hanging component. Two vertical wall strips are typically required to support a hanging component. Conventional vertical wall strips measure 60 in., 72 in., or 84 in. in height, with the longer wall strips requiring more wall fasteners for attachment to the wall than the shorter wall strips.
Unfortunately, a vertical wall strip system limits the placement of such hanging components at pre-existing vertical points along the movable wall where a vertical wall strip has been attached to the movable wall. The placement of the vertical wall strips is determined during initial design of the interior space limiting the furniture and component shelf-life because their size becomes an issue. In order to address this problem, integrated horizontal mounting channels have now been designed into movable walls allowing for storage and furniture component bearing. The horizontal mounting channels or “antlers” typically run the width of the modular wall panels that form the movable wall and can be placed at any height. A horizontal mounting channel may be positioned at the level of the hanging component to be supported on the movable wall. A plurality of vertically spaced horizontal mounting channels may be disposed in the movable wall or modular panels. Horizontal mounting channels may be formed during fabrication of the panel and/or added or removed on the job site. Until this development, movable walls did not have the horizontal support available to support hanging components. With this development, furniture and storage components have a longer life-cycle because their size is no longer an issue during reconfiguration. Horizontal mounting channels allow the end-user to support hanging components along the horizontal mounting channels i.e. the end-user can go “off-modular.” This means that the modular wall panels can be standardized without worrying about the size of the furniture to be attached to the movable wall. The furniture and storage components as well as other hanging components can now hang anywhere along the movable walls, on the vertical and horizontal axes, and not just in pre-existing vertical points determined during initial design of the interior space. A movable wall that incorporates such horizontal mounting channels is referred to herein as a “horizontal wall system.”
For example, U.S. Patent Published Application 2006/0059806 filed Aug. 17, 2005 by Gosling et al. incorporated by reference herein describes a reconfigurable movable wall system having at least one wall module having vertical end frames disposed at its side edges, each of the vertical end frames having vertically extending flanges with one extending toward a front surface of the module and the other extending toward a rear surface of the module, a plurality of horizontal stringers (i.e. horizontal mounting channels) affixed between the pair of vertical end frames, an aesthetic surface affixed to the stringers and a removable connecting strip adapted to affix about one of the two flanges to join it to a corresponding flange on a second wall module, a wall bracket, a finishing trim or a connection post. The plurality of horizontal stringers is horizontally spaced at intervals along the height of the module for strength and rigidity. To support hanging components, cantilever channel stringers including a central horizontally extending cantilever channel portion are used. The channel portion has a generally L-shaped slot formed along its length. Stringers that do not include the channel portion can be used anywhere structure is required but the channel portion is not required for supporting hanging components. A conventional movable wall system typically needs five antlers or horizontal stringers for each furniture-bearing wall. A related panel furniture system is also described whereby a work surface or desktop with a substantially L-shaped hook can be received and engage the L-shaped slot of the channel portion to connect the furniture to the module of the movable wall.
While a movable horizontal wall system, such as that described in Gosling et al., offers distinct advantages for movable wall systems, its use has generally been limited to furniture or other hanging components with the L-shaped hook that can engage with the horizontal stringers. For those hanging components conventionally supported on movable walls by a vertical wall strip system, their support on horizontal wall systems has disadvantageously necessitated modifications to the movable walls and/hanging components and/or attachment hardware. Such modifications have been costly, and may compromise the structural integrity of the modified item. For example, modular furniture offered by such manufacturers as Herman Miller are typically incompatible with horizontal wall systems without substantial modification of the walls and/or hanging components and/or attachment hardware because such furniture uses a vertical wall strip system for mounting to a movable wall. The bracket described in Applicant's co-pending application Ser. No. 12/132,454, permits modular furniture to be supported on a movable wall having horizontal mounting channels in a movable wall system.
In addition to supporting modular furniture, the movable wall with horizontal mounting channels may also need to support one or more cubicle walls. Such cubicle walls permit reconfiguration of rooms or the like and generally add to the flexibility of modular wall systems. Unfortunately, movable walls such as that described in Gosling et al. do not permit support of any cubicle walls other than cubicle walls specifically designed for use with the Gosling et al. movable wall system.
Accordingly, there has been a need for a bracket and method for supporting a cubicle wall on a movable wall having at least one horizontal mounting channel. There has also been a need for such a bracket and method that supports the cubicle wall on a movable wall in a manner allowing for weight bearing in both the vertical and horizontal axes. There is a still further need for such a bracket and method that are relatively inexpensive and where the use thereof does not necessitate substantial modification of the movable wall, cubicle wall, or the attachment hardware used to removably attach the cubicle wall. There is a further need for a bracket and method that reduce the number of horizontal mounting channels per furniture bearing wall thus providing both a cost savings and an increase in visual continuity of the modular wall panels. The present invention fulfills these needs and provides other related advantages.